Eight years have passed since those four planes changed the lives of so many Americans on September 11, 2001. Survivors continue to cope, their children grow, rescuers struggle with the physical aftereffects of so many hours spent combing through the wreckage, and the new WTC is finally under construction. But for those not immediately effected by the attacks, enough time has passed that they becoming historical events, albeit mile markers in our lifetimes. So it is perhaps especially fitting that this year legislation has been enacted declaring September 11 A National Day of Service and Remembrance.
Service
The home page for 9/11 National Day of Service and Remembrance provides information about the purpose of the day, ways individuals can become involved, ways organizations or individuals can get service projects going or seek out additional volunteers, and links to other informational sites. Visitors are encouraged to post their own activities as a way to inspire others and stimulate others' thinking. If you are interested in volunteering, however, don't feel limited to the options offered by the 9/11 web site. VolunteerMatch offers additional opportunities to bring together volunteers and organizations online. Currently Danville's volunteer organizations are not well represented on the site, so if you are active in one you might want to suggest the site to the volunteer coordinator. Government volunteering opportunities have their own online site, Volunteer.gov, where users can identify possibilities by state. To locate opportunities locally, the United Way has assembled this list of Danville organizations and contact information, while Champaign-Urbana has cuvolunteer.org.
Want some ideas for simple acts of kindness and service? Check out HelpOthers.org, which offers lots of suggestions. The Random Acts of Kindness Foundation also offers ideas to promote kindness and service to others and even provides tools for teachers and individuals to use to get started in their own communities.
Remembrance
While the new designation for September 11 is intended to draw good from bad, it is also designed as an opportunity to remember and learn. To that end, the National September 11 Museum and Memorial at the World Trade Center is being planned. With the WTC complex still tangled in ongoing construction and funding issues, it remains in a virtual stage, but that leaves a lot available for exploration, including an extensive registry of artists and their works, oral histories recorded through the Library of Congress' StoryCorps project, and pictures and stories of the some of the artifacts that have been donated to the Museum. September 11 Bearing Witness to History, the Smithsonian's collection of artifacts related to the attacks, is an especially moving site, with an extensive set of artifacts and stories, while the September 11 Digital Archive offers one of the most comprehensive collections of information. And finally, the National Park Service is creating a memorial in Shanksville, PA where Flight 93 was brought down through the brave efforts of its passengers to defeat the hijackers. See the plans for the memorial here.
Thursday, September 10, 2009
Friday, September 4, 2009
Health Care Reform?
Everyone is talking about health care reform, but a lot of people have several misconceptions about various aspects of the conversation. How well do you understand this very complicated issue? You can test your knowledge with either CNN's quick quiz or that compiled by the Friends Committee on National Legislation, or both. (They touch on different points.)
Finding Good Facts
If your email has been brimming with scary emails about what the Congressional health plan might mean for you, you should check out FactCheck.org's evaluation of the most notorious of these fearmongering missives in which they found 26 outright lies and only 4 genuine truths among 48 claims. Another excellent source of information on the issue is CQ Researcher, a weekly publication that examines current issues in depth. (You'll need your DACC user ID and password for off-campus access.) They covered health care reform in last week's issue (8-28-09), which offers extensive reporting, background, pros and cons of particular aspects and references to find further information. Somewhat similar to CQ Researcher is Issues and Controversies, a Facts on File database that provides detailed, balanced coverage of current topics. (You'll also need your DACC user ID and password for off-campus access for this.) It too includes recent material covering the health care debate, especially issues related to the proposed public option.
Been watching coverage of all of those raucous town hall meetings? You might be surprised to find that they aren't quite what they appear on news programs on FOX or MSNBC or other media outlets. You can see the entire meetings, not just edited clips, on C-Span, the Congressional news channel. In fact, if you are interested in unbiased coverage of the entire issue, you can't do better than C-Span, which provides full coverage of meetings, hearings, and public statements, and also has an area for viewers to submit material. Feeling brave? Here's the actual text of the legislation H.R. 3200 , which is available through Thomas, the Library of Congress legislation search engine. Actually, it's not too bad. The bill has an index of terms you can use to search through it and a summary of contents.
Two excellent sources of online information on the state of the U.S. health care system are The Commonwealth Fund, which includes on its web site a report that compares the United States health care system to those in other countries. (The conclusion: ours comes off very poorly on several crucial counts.) The other is The Alliance for Health Reform's Covering Health Issues, 5th ed.
And finally, a moment of health care debate humor from The Onion.
H1N1 Flu Update
And little bit of additional information on the flu formerly known as swine. Here is a very useful flyer from the Illinois Department of Public Health that itemizes the symptoms and emergency warning signs to determine if you or a family member needs to go and see a doctor. They also provide a preparedness checklist to help you get ready for the flu hitting home. Here is the IDPH's general web page about the pandemic and seasonal flu, which has links to lots of good information. And on a final note, a new concern about this flu involves whether or not to vaccinate pigs to prevent them catching the flu from people and mutating it into yet another and potentially more dangerous variant. Yes, the swine are now at risk from the people flu...
Finding Good Facts
If your email has been brimming with scary emails about what the Congressional health plan might mean for you, you should check out FactCheck.org's evaluation of the most notorious of these fearmongering missives in which they found 26 outright lies and only 4 genuine truths among 48 claims. Another excellent source of information on the issue is CQ Researcher, a weekly publication that examines current issues in depth. (You'll need your DACC user ID and password for off-campus access.) They covered health care reform in last week's issue (8-28-09), which offers extensive reporting, background, pros and cons of particular aspects and references to find further information. Somewhat similar to CQ Researcher is Issues and Controversies, a Facts on File database that provides detailed, balanced coverage of current topics. (You'll also need your DACC user ID and password for off-campus access for this.) It too includes recent material covering the health care debate, especially issues related to the proposed public option.
Been watching coverage of all of those raucous town hall meetings? You might be surprised to find that they aren't quite what they appear on news programs on FOX or MSNBC or other media outlets. You can see the entire meetings, not just edited clips, on C-Span, the Congressional news channel. In fact, if you are interested in unbiased coverage of the entire issue, you can't do better than C-Span, which provides full coverage of meetings, hearings, and public statements, and also has an area for viewers to submit material. Feeling brave? Here's the actual text of the legislation H.R. 3200 , which is available through Thomas, the Library of Congress legislation search engine. Actually, it's not too bad. The bill has an index of terms you can use to search through it and a summary of contents.
Two excellent sources of online information on the state of the U.S. health care system are The Commonwealth Fund, which includes on its web site a report that compares the United States health care system to those in other countries. (The conclusion: ours comes off very poorly on several crucial counts.) The other is The Alliance for Health Reform's Covering Health Issues, 5th ed.
And finally, a moment of health care debate humor from The Onion.
H1N1 Flu Update
And little bit of additional information on the flu formerly known as swine. Here is a very useful flyer from the Illinois Department of Public Health that itemizes the symptoms and emergency warning signs to determine if you or a family member needs to go and see a doctor. They also provide a preparedness checklist to help you get ready for the flu hitting home. Here is the IDPH's general web page about the pandemic and seasonal flu, which has links to lots of good information. And on a final note, a new concern about this flu involves whether or not to vaccinate pigs to prevent them catching the flu from people and mutating it into yet another and potentially more dangerous variant. Yes, the swine are now at risk from the people flu...
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